red spider lily of god
by Discordia Design
Summary: Not exactly what Jacqueline "Jack" Renaud thought would happen after she flew out of a car window, making friends with the asphalt.
1. Chapter 1

_daylily: loss of what could have been_

The first memory Maylis Laclair has is of standing in the garden, toddler pudgy hands fisted into her mother's dress, a slight breeze pulling at dark burgundy locks. Ninon Laclair hums a song with no words, simply enjoying the warm morning sunlight. A dilapidated house creaks behind them. It's a gentle scene at odds with the painfully poor lifestyle they live.

A gentle moment in time Maylis wishes she cherished more.

Standing a little above her mother's knees, Maylis can't help seeing the soft orange horizon as some sort of omen. The curled and knotted space within Maylis's heart that was once named Jacqueline Renaud hisses at the painfully domestic and movie-like scene, a lost and confused teenager being assaulted by the vague memory sensations of the young girl known as Maylis Laclair.

Jacqueline refuses to give into the child, nearly four years of life is nothing against Jack's nineteen years of age after all. Maylis is confused, a moment of broken peace, before moving to follow her mother to clumsily help tend to the vegetables. It's a fairly normal routine of waking, eating a sparse breakfast, gardening, and then playing with worn hand sewn dolls until dinner except for the days Maylis's mother drops her off at their distant neighbors house. Ninon sells cheap ink dyed fabrics in the larger villages, green and black stained fingertips carefully hidden by pristine gloves.

On really successful days Ninon will come home tired and triumphed, a basket of food and maybe, just maybe, a thin book to help teach Maylis to read. Jacqueline can read and write and dance and do all kinds of things that Maylis doesn't know about but they seem important.

Except none of what Jacqueline can do, or rather, could do (once upon a time), matters because right now Jacqueline Renaud is Maylis Laclair. Except the part curled and knotted in Maylis's heart that burns and aches with a longing for what can never be brought back - that other life, that other world, the one Jacqueline was ripped from by a reckless driver and the blood painted asphalt road covered in glass. Jack the snarky American girl feels small inside Maylis the innocent French child.

Maylis scrunches up her nose at a wiggling worm that she disturbed trying to poke at the carrots and onions. A tinkling bell draws her attention, Ninon is softly laughing at her disgruntled expression, hazel eyes with glimpses of amber when the light hits them just right hold all the love of a mother. Jack reluctantly recalls Ninon telling Maylis that she inherited her grandmother Melina's teal colored eyes. Jack ignores the slight disappointment that this body does not resemble the kind woman who tries so hard for her little girl who isn't truly just a normal child.

Maylis sticks her tongue out, Jack sighs with a lingering fondness that can't be fully ignored, Ninon lightly taps on her daughter's nose to get her to go back to helping with the vegetables.

Everyday that Maylis learns, even if it's just that worms are icky and weird, a phantom piece of Jacqueline disappears. Reincarnated souls aren't meant to remember. Jack supposes it has to do with the faint not-abyss moments of awareness between hitting pavement with a snapcrunchnothing and the white of hospital walls. Jack isn't sure how many times she was revived, either through sheer bullheaded incomprehension of death or the stubbornness of EMTs. It just felt unnatural since Jack was aware on some level she died and was being brought back to a body that did not want to house a soul any longer.

It was a cold thought, one that made Jack curl around the last of the pieces of tattered memory that remained tighter. Jacqueline Renaud is Maylis Laclair but Maylis Laclair is not Jacqueline Renaud.

Hours pass, Maylis fumbles with the wooden blocks that have paint peeling off in an attempt build a castle. Jack settles in and unfurls for a moment, images of better looking block houses floating behind Maylis's eyes. The child frowns before nodding to herself, chin length hair bouncing. The little block houses aren't as grand as the castle Maylis wanted but still fun.

* * *

Maylis is five years old when her mother does not return from selling the pretty fabrics at the nearest village. Jack absently shushes the girl as an aunt they never knew they had drags her to a carriage. Crying will not help.

Ninon Laclair with her gentle hazel eyes with flecks of amber in sunlight and wavy burgundy red hair that always curled upwards at the ends was not going to come home. The woman Jack had come to accept as a second mother was never going to be able to make things better.

Instead of outright bawling as instincts mandated, Maylis only began to sniffle and held her watery gaze to the rough carpet of the carriage. Her mother was never coming home and they could never garden the pretty flowers behind the creaky house again.

Instead of burn with longing for that other life that she could never get back, the half-forgotten picturesque memory of a mother she could never go home to, Jack slackened her grip around tattered memories. A precious few of them lost their edge and faded from mind and heart. Perhaps it would be better to just leave. To not influence and make the child suffer from the things Jack has gone through since waking to a new life. That grief was not meant for a child who has just lost their mother.

Maylis Laclair was once a different girl named Jacqueline Renaud. Jacqueline Renaud could never be Maylis Laclair. More bluntly, Maylis Laclair did not need Jacqueline Renaud, and so with grace that Jack never had in her own life, she let go.

It was a slow but inevitable process.

Solange Larue would never claim to being good with children, that was more of her runaway half sister's expertise, but even Solange was certain that little girls that just lost their mother's should not be so withdrawn and cold. Solange expected many things from Ninon's child, loud crying, shouting even, fits of temper she'd have a right to for being uprooted from all she's ever known, not this uneasy state of calm gently enveloping little Lily.

Ninon's little Lily was strange and quiet and only let her eyes water but never cried. Jack has already been uprooted from all that she's ever known, the least she could do is shush that incessant need to plead for Ninon to come back and ease the tiny spikes of panic of being in an unfamiliar place inside Maylis.

Jack does not know Solange Larue but she can see the badly hidden grief of having lost a loved one where Maylis only sees a stiff and mean looking lady. With luck, Jack can impart a little emotional awareness to Maylis before... Well, Jack didn't know.

Jack didn't know what would happen when every little memory and piece that made up Jacqueline Renaud disappeared. It might mean just that, that Jack would just disappear into the ether, and yet considering the situation, Jack was sure she'd just be properly reabsorbed by Maylis - perhaps the right way she was supposed to in the first place during reincarnation. It didn't sound as bad now compared to a few years ago.

Maylis was a child innocent of Jack's nineteen years of life and troubles. It should remain that way. One complete soul instead of one new soul and the tattered remains of the old one in one body. Jack didn't want to die - except she already did. Jack has been fighting a futile battle but in the end could not bring herself to kick out Maylis Laclair to have another chance at life. This world has nothing to offer Jack.

It would not bring back her old world, her old life, her old friends that she can no longer recall the names of, her old family that she can only sometimes recall the faces of. This was not Jacqueline Renaud's life anymore.

Wild daylilies pushed at the fence around Solange's tiny well kept house, intent on blooming free and unfettered wherever they wanted.

Three weeks into hesitantly finding a schedule or routine in Solange's house, Maylis can only put a hand to her chest, unmindful of the grass strains sure to earn a harsh word or two from her estranged aunt later on. Daylilies sway with the wind, Maylis is five years and suddenly alone except Jack shaped threads woven into her heart.

* * *

Disclaimer: I own nothing within D Gray Man.

Writing on a phone is hard and not recommended.


	2. Chapter 2

"You're going to float away in those stories of yours, girl."

"I will not," the fourteen year old insisted without looking up from the well-worn book she was reading from, "if there were more interesting things to do."

Glancing up from the collection of fairy tales and fables, Maylis ignored her auntie's mildly exasperated look in favor of trying to find any more grey hairs in Solange's braid. Which was not her fault, she never did anything. She wasn't like those girls in town that made their mother's worry and father's grimace at their fancy smancy family names being dragged through mud and other rubbish.

Give Maylis a book or a blank journal to draw in any day. Which might be her auntie's issue, paper and ink wasn't exactly cheap at the moment with the new mayor falling from public favor recently. It was driving the local businesses a bit off their rocker, but if money was the issue...

Maylis had wanted to get an interview with that tiny, side corner bakery across town, until Solange put her foot down and arranged a field trip with her ex husband. Nothing wrong with Fabrice but the man was a bit of a wimp when aunt Solange wanted something.

Next week Solange would be going to the town over with Fabrice to a specialty shop. Or was it a tailors shop? Maylis didn't know why her aunt didn't use her seamstress skills in town, although she had an idea. Her auntie's headstrong personality and blunt nature with those pretty ladies that had all the dresses and oh-so-faint hearts? Disastrous.

That did not explain why Maylis was not allowed to try for a job. The most she would've been expected to do was dish washing, sweeping the shop, or preparing the ingredients Miss Audrey used to make her divine cakes. That's what Anne, who was a nice girl when she wasn't with the rest of that vicious pack of social snobs, said she did when her mum made her help out there.

Basic menial chores for a bit of extra coin and maybe a free pastry or two.

If her aunt was worried about the local gossip and other nastiness that come with having to service the uptown girls, the obvious lies they spun didn't affect Maylis. That was why some of them were always mad at her, she didn't cry or get angry when they tried to make her feel bad for not going to their elitist school.

The town wasn't that big and it was just a common public school and yet they harped about it like it was a city university. Maylis would bet her best right hook against their makeup fake faces that she could read levels above them. Sure, Maylis couldn't articulate her arguments to her thoughts and daydreamed more than socialize, but she knew for a fact that most of the petty fights they tried to pick where worthless and thus Maylis stayed out of their way, usually left alone.

Besides, the only people Maylis has actually hit were boys, not girls. She failed to see why her aunt always shook her head in faint bemusement before lecturing her on ladylike things. Solange wasn't very ladylike herself but that might just be her old age making her not care as much. In which case, Maylis didn't need to do ladylike things if she wouldn't care later on. She could be polite and unobtrusive without the pretty words and uncomfortable shoes.

"-that does not mean I'm alright with leaving you here alone."

Oh. She was going to be lectured again. Clearing her throat awkwardly, Maylis peered up at her aunt pacing the living room looking for something.

Solange's braid was coming loose from a day of packing, once bright red hair now dulled with age and neglect, a few stands of silvery grey interwoven.

Unlike what Maylis blearily recalled of her mother, aunt Solange had a brighter, more vibrant shade of red hair that was neat and straight. She also has dark brown eyes that smoldered with distaste at Maylis's mud covered boots and grass stained skirts. As far as Maylis has been able to figure out without asking, Solange's father was a German man that died when her aunt was but a girl and Solange took her mother's maiden name when she got older. Maylis's mother was born when Solange was a teen barely older than Maylis is now.

Maylis is very curious about what Melina Larue was like, one husband dead and the other man walking out soon after Ninon was born. Ninon had kept her father's name regardless, a bit of bad blood between mother and daughter. That all came to a head when Ninon found herself seventeen and pregnant. Ninon ran away to the French countryside instead of dealing with the family pity and ire.

Somewhere between Ninon running away and dying, grandmother Melina died and Solange moved to this town, only belatedly finding out about her younger sister's death. Maylis found most of this out through the little knick knacks and yellowed letters Solange kept in the closet secret box. It was suppose to be a secret box but Maylis is a curious girl and was an even more curious child when first taken in.

Solange turned on her heel to fully address the importance of whatever she's been talking to her about, all of which Maylis did not hear while she was thinking of that elusive bakery job. Maylis pointedly did not smile at her aunt. Solange was always more suspicious of Maylis when she smiled like that because Maylis always smiled when she was caught doing things she was told not to.

"Little Lily, were you listening or did you fly off in your own world again?" She didn't hear a word of it.

Taking a guess, it wasn't hard, Maylis was rarely left home alone or allowed to stay out near curfew that long. Once again, unfair. "Your trip to the town over?"

Solange gave her an unimpressed look and a sharp nod, "Just that, but you still didn't hear a word I said. Listen when spoken to, girl. Just because you go through books like candy don't mean a thing out there."

Pursuing her lips slightly, Maylis set her book down on the coffee table and glanced back to her aunt who still looked vexed with her short attention span. It was really hard to fight off a sheepish smile or keep her hands still in her lap.

"Hmm, close enough for you, girl. What I was saying is that you'll be coming with over to Oleander. You can take care of yourself while I'm away but maybe getting you out of the house to find less damaging hobbies will keep you from burning the house down."

Oooh, new things. Maylis didn't even wince at the accusation, she was well aware she did not do multitasking very easily, in her defense though... Those curtain drapes on the kitchen windows were ugly. The new ones were much better and let in more light. Her attempts at bacon were less appetizing despite the new drapes making the kitchen look better. Maylis could make good cookies and other pastries just fine but real food was beyond her grasp without experiments. And fire.

There was a lot of fire when she attempted to make meatballs for that nights spaghetti. The next day Solange barred Maylis from making anything but pastries without supervision.

Maylis leaned back in the armchair she commandeered for herself before her aunt came looking for her, "I'm going with you? Is that okay? What's in Oleander? Is that where Fabrice lives? Could I buy-"

"You'll see for yourself when we get there!" Solange picked up the spare keys behind the couch it seems she was looking for and hastily backtracked out of the living room. Her aunt really didn't like dealing with questions or children, which was often a package and Maylis was no different in that aspect.

Maylis was all but ready to jump out of her seat and dance around.

Solange stuck her head through the door frame before Maylis could stand up and glared at the girl. "That means less dilly dallying and more getting packed for a few days. We're leaving tomorrow morning, no later than eight!"

With that ominous deadline declared, Solange swept back out of the room, her shawl flaring out behind her. Maylis sank back down into the armchair and sighed. More work, less play.

Or was it all work, no play?

* * *

Disclaimer: I don't own D Gray Man.


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